Annette Bening's performance as a grande dame of the British theater in the
1930s is not the sole reason to see the conventional backstage drama "Being
Julia," but it's the best reason. Yes, Jeremy Irons is as sure-footed and
smooth as one would like as the diva's entrepreneur husband, a former actor
who decided he was better suited to producing and booking shows than
appearing in them. But the film lives and dies with Bening's Julia, whose
presence is potent enough to overcome the lack of range shown by callow,
shallow Shaun Evans as a young American who comes to London and worms his way into the glamorous older woman's life. The rest of the cast is
top-notch: Michael Gambon as Julia's late mentor; Bruce Greenwood as her
best friend and frequent escort; Juliet Stevenson as her dresser; and, in
other colorful supporting roles, Rosemary Harris, Miriam Margolyes and Maury
Chaykin. All of the necessary literary credentials are in order: The script
by Ronald Harwood, Oscar-winning screenwriter of "The Pianist," is based on
the novel by W. Somerset Maugham ("Of Human Bondage"). And Hungarian
director István Szabó is in a familiar milieu, having visited the early and middle parts of the 20th century in his generational family epic "Sunshine" and his post-World War II morality tale "Taking Sides." Those uninterested in period pieces or the peccadilloes of theater people won't care.